


five minutes

by orphan_account



Category: Polygon/McElroy Vlogs & Podcasts RPF
Genre: Friends to Lovers, M/M, Mutual Pining, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Pining, Slow Burn, Unrequited Crush, or at least thats where im going with it eventually
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-15
Updated: 2019-10-06
Packaged: 2020-10-19 00:17:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 16,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20648081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Brian hadn’t -- Brian hadn’t started Pat's Gay Panic, tee em, exactly, but he hadn’t made it any easier, or better, or whatever.typical "wait no i'm not allowed to feel this way about my younger male coworker what do i do" sort of thing. read this if you enjoy just an obscene amount of pining and far too many commas!





	1. history read

**Author's Note:**

> *pats fic* this bad boy can fit so much projection!
> 
> if you're uncomfy with rpf, know the people in this fic, or are one of the people named here, please please leave i'm so sorry for all of it. this is just me taking names and vague personalities and playing what-if, and isn't meant to be speculation or anything.
> 
> be gentle with me, this is my first fic i've posted here and the first polygon one i've written ever, so! mostly posting this so i can hold myself accountable for finishing something for once

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: internalized homophobia

Brian hadn’t -- Brian hadn’t started his Gay Panic, _tee em_, exactly, but he hadn’t made it any easier, or better, or whatever. 

Pat had been thinking a lot about his sexuality before Brian even entered the picture. Before he’d gotten that notification from Tara saying that some kid from Baltimore had mentioned him in his application video for Polygon, before he’d clicked through some of his older videos in preparation for Brian’s first day at work, before he’d been given the duty to show the bright-eyed and bushy-haired, vaguely-anxious new kid around the office. Before they’d been shoved into videos together and realized they had a lot in common, before he’d asked Brian out to a bar to celebrate his first month at the job and watched him dance, reckless and loose and like no one was watching, which was wholly untrue. Before they started hanging out at one another’s houses on weekends and making dumb playlists for each other and teasing each other for their respective footwear. Before the tug that Pat felt in his sternum whenever he managed to make Brian laugh, which was -- well, it wasn’t that uncommon, to be fair, Brian laughed at everything, but still. It made him happier than he had any right to, was the thing.

Pat had started questioning his sexuality a ways before that, and he had evidence to prove it. Fairly big evidence, actually: a divorce. 

He would have felt extra shitty, really, if it had been Brian, but luckily, the divorce happened a few months before he’d even heard of Brian. As it was, he felt pretty shitty, as much as his wife -- well, ex -- told him not to; it wasn’t his fault, she’d say, that his feelings for her weren’t romantic. He hadn’t lied to her, exactly, telling her that he’d fallen out of love, that they’d rushed into things and he wasn’t sure if he’d ever had the sort of feelings he was supposed to have for someone as important as a wife: love, sure, but not the sort she deserved. And it was true. He’d loved her, just not -- just not, like, like that, and he didn’t really want to spend the little energy he had leftover from feeling guilty about the whole thing to parse out why, exactly, he didn’t love her the right way, why nothing he’d had so far with any of his girlfriends had really felt like love.

The Gay Panic, _tee em_, had been occurring (albeit in a shoved-down, dark, vaguely terrifying box-like place) on and off since high school, when Pat had -- sort of unintentionally, really -- stumbled into theater. He’d been peer pressured into auditioning for a part in the spring musical by a couple friends, new ones at a new school, and while he hadn’t gotten a very big part, he had been forced into a tech crew, as everyone was. He’d chosen set building, and had accidentally risen up the ranks and eventually even stage managed a little. That was what had bonded him and Simone, at first, actually; too much time wrangling so many dramatic people to do such easy tasks that they really, really did not want to do. 

Anyways, being in theater had, stereotypically, meant he’d been around a lot of other gay kids. Once during a dress rehearsal, he’d been with one of the other set building boys in the hallways that led from backstage to outside (nicknamed Sex Alley due to its low lighting and general seclusion), when Pat realized that he’d been flirting with him for the past half hour and was not opposed to the idea of kissing him. Another time, during a cast party, a different boy had been dared to give him a lap dance, which had led to a drunken make-out session in someone’s closet later. 

Mostly, it was just general exposure to people who wouldn’t hate him if it turned out he liked boys, if it turned out that boys were the subject of most of his fantasies, both when it came to sex and when it came to weddings and hand-holding and sleepy kisses. 

He’d considered doing something about it then, really doing something, some sort of declaration or coming out, but then they’d moved to a much more conservative town, and he’d met Emma, and they’d gotten along so well that he forgot about the Gay Panic. She’d made him laugh and hope and feel comfortable enough to tell her his most vulnerable secrets, and he’d picked out her favorite green jellybeans for her and kissed her neck where she liked it and been impressed rather than mad when she beat him at his favorite video games. 

Eventually, when it came time to pick colleges, he followed her to UMaine because it was safe, or, well, _she_ was safe. It wasn’t much of a decision, really; she was the only person he felt good around, and so what if it wasn’t exactly the right kind of love, because at least it was love, and maybe that as all he was ever going to get. Pat had proposed one night, late, after he’d made breakfast for dinner like they liked to do -- mostly because it was fun, but also because eggs and pancake mix were cheap as hell and neither of them made that much money. It was impromptu, but she’d loved him through all of it, through everything, even when he’d started working more and more, and become a little more distant, and messed up his wedding vows, and gotten a cat without telling her, and forgot their anniversary once, because they were _happy_. __

When Pat let himself think about everything, that was what choked him up the most: they’d been happy, and he’d gone and ruined it by not feeling like it was enough. He knew, he really did -- because he had other gay friends, one who had even gone through a similar thing, and because his therapist told him the same thing -- that it was necessary. That there was no other way it could have gone. 

Either way, he felt sad and guilty and lonely and a little mad at himself about it. 

At first, Pat didn’t tell anyone else that it was about the Gay Panic thing, _tee em_, except for Charles, late at night, when he was at his most depressed, when the thoughts wouldn’t repress themselves like he willed them to. Eventually, he’d told Simone, when they were up far too late one night on a work trip. He was sleep deprived, and they were waiting for something to download and asking each other questions from a list she’d found on Tumblr. He wasn’t as into the whole Tumblr thing, as far as he could tell; Twitter was his first and only love, apart from an Instagram account he set on private and only let a couple people follow. And, like, Twitch, obviously.

“Oh-kay, question numero nineteen,” Simone had said. “Reason for your last -- uh, maybe, maybe we -- maybe we don’t do this one.” She scrolled down, avoiding eye contact as her cheeks turned pink. 

“No, wait, what’d it say?” Pat had grabbed her phone from her, impolite in his sleepiness. He flipped it towards him, reading the question in his head. “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“Reason for your last breakup.” 

“Yeah. Listen, it’s fine, I know it was--”

“No, here, ok, it’s uh -- I don’t -- I can...uh, I can say it.”

“Pat--”

“I’m gay.” That had shut them both up, then, and Pat had messed with his hair with one hand and set the phone down in the other. “I uh -- I realized I didn’t -- uh, I’m gay. I think. Maybe.”

_As far as coming outs go_, Pat had thought, _not the most eloquent._

Simone had only given him a very sweet side-hug, though, and told him about her whole sexuality deal, and went into depth about her own coming out, and it had been enough of a funny story that he’d forgotten about how big of a deal the previous thirty seconds had been. 

And that was it. He was gay, and out, if only to one person (and one cat), and that was something, at least. 

He didn’t elaborate that night, and the issue didn’t resurface at all, really, until -- well, until Brian. Until Brian and his wunderkid, manic-pixie-dream-boy, ex-theater kid self, his propensity to make everyone and everything laugh and fall for him just a little, his lightbulb-shaped head and jorts-and-turtleneck thing that shouldn’t have been hot but absolutely were, his -- well, his vibe that people on the internet called “chaotic bisexual energy,” his painted nails and picked-at cuticles, his near-silent laugh, his funny-but-serious spicy takes, his ability to be so breathlessly earnest that it made Pat speechless, just a little.

Also, and this was the thought that distracted Pat an alarming amount, the kind of thing that he sometimes worried would give him permanent forehead wrinkles -- was Brian actually bisexual, like everyone on the internet had decided he was? Pat knew Brian had had girlfriends, had listened to enough of his music to be strangely affected by the female pronouns in a few songs, had seen him flirting with the occasional girl at work or at a shop. But that didn’t, some demon part of Pat’s brain told him, mean that he didn’t like boys. On the other hand, no matter how hard Pat tried, he could not for the fucking life of him figure out a way to discreetly ask in a way that didn’t make it sound like he had a crush on Brian. 

It wasn’t like he was practicing in front of the mirror like only people in movies every actually did, but he did think about how exactly to bring it up much more than he would like to admit.

_What am I doing tonight? Oh, just hanging out with my bisexual friend Thomas. Speaking of bisexuality, is that something you are?_

_The other day, I was reading the comments on something and they said you were bi. So weird when people, like, diagnose sexuality like that. But also, like, is that true? _

_Hey, Brian, so like, not to be intrusive as shit, but like, do you like guys? Oh, uh, why am I asking? No reason, really._

It was going to drive him insane, one of these days. But like, the alternative was purposefully putting himself in an uncomfortable situation, one that could lead to places that Pat did not want any conversation with Brian to lead, at least not yet, and so he held his tongue. 

+++

Pat felt like he and Brian’s friendship could have gone any number of ways. Could have gone the direction of “casual work friends” if he wanted it to, could have taken a while, could have taken a really long while. Instead, it felt more like something barreling forward from the very beginning. Not quite inevitable, not that, because there was definitely an alternate reality where they weren’t friends at all, where they never even met. Pat didn’t quite believe in fate like that. But it was -- it was nothing, and then it was something, very quickly, in a way that wasn’t exactly normal for Pat. Normally, he was too chickenshit for this kind of thing, for getting past small talk and into hanging out after work and texting when you didn’t need to text, but somehow, everything collided together in a way that collided _them_ together quicker than normal. 

The two of them had clicked from the start, really, because they shared the same interest in cool video games and socialist politics and absurdist dumb humor and really, it was mostly the absurdist dumb humor that brought them together, because Pat had this stupid, stupid obsession with making Brian laugh. Everyone made Brian laugh, Brian was pretty much constantly on the verge of laughing, but Pat got this rush of adrenaline and pride and joy whenever he made Brian laugh that he felt almost addicted to it. Brian pushed him to be goofier, to say whatever dumbass thing came into his head, to catch Brian off guard with the weirdest thing he could say, and that was maybe where the whole thing started in the first place. The way that Brian let his whole body laugh with him and crinkled up his eyes in delight and tried to talk through it and then, like, five minutes after a particularly good joke, would randomly burst into laughter again, and the way that it made Pat smile like a motherfucker, mostly against his own will.

Anyways, so Pat was addicted to making Brian laugh. And also just generally smile. So maybe that was why, when Brian asked, casually as anything, if Pat wanted to come to one of his shows, he said, in his dumb goblin voice, “Why yes Brian, I would love to go to your show, and then perhaps I can stab you,” just to see Brian laugh and without really thinking of the implications of actually going out to a show. Without thinking about going out, and dressing semi-nicely, and being in a crowd until late, and socializing, and all that. Whatever. It would be mostly fine, and so what if he’d backed himself into a corner? So what if the idea sounded ridiculously, idiotically daunting? He went to shows all the time, _shows without people you know_, one of his brain cells said, _shows where you could be anonymous and mosh a little without really being a person_. Whatever. 

He’d said yes, and that was that.

What he hadn’t particularly thought about, though, or really prepared himself for in any way, was the idea of Brian performing. 

Pat showed up in the most casual-but-nice outfit he owned; blue button-up short-sleeve shirt, black jeans, orange Converse. He looked hip, if he said so himself, and not at all like someone who’d spent a half hour picking out clothes when everyone else at the office had just come straight from work. Whatever. 

He chatted with Jenna and Allegra a bit, lightly bullied Simone for showing up even later than him, got a beer, took deep breaths, gave himself a mental pep talk. It was okay, he was okay, everything was fine, actually, genuinely, for fucking once.

And then Brian started singing. 

They’d gotten a table in the front, and so he had a direct view of Brian. Brian, on the stage, in his element, performing. Brian, hotter than anyone had any right to be in jeans and a white v-neck. Brian, giving off fucking waves of charm, with ever-so-slight tinges of anxiety that showed up in the way he played with his hair a little and pushed up his glasses. Brian, holding the microphone with his purple-painted fingers like it was a magic wand, like he was magic, which. Maybe he was, at this point, Pat honestly didn’t know. Brian, closing his eyes at the high notes, starting out soft and building in dynamic as he went. Brian, making eye contact with Pat for one millisecond and smiling so wide that the song went all wobbly for a second, which turned Pat fully inside out with feeling. Brian, physically eviscerating Pat every time they made eye contact or he brushed a bit of his hair away or jumped just enough during a faster song for the bottom of his stomach to show a little or held a note during a sad song and let his emotions slip through the perfect amount. Brian, fucking beautiful with the stage lights in his hair. Brian, moving in ways that caused Pat to have to look away because it felt like the part of a roller coaster where you finally tip over the edge and your stomach leaves your body and is replaced by swarms of butterflies. 

Brian. God, _Brian_. 

If he thought making Brian smile in normal conversation was addicting, getting Brian to smile during a performance was on a whole ‘nother goddamn plane entirely.

When it was over, half of him, the part that wanted to stay far away from the deep-dark boxlike place in his brain, fucking ran home to avoid having to actually talk to Brian. 

The other half, the half that had been responsible for saying yes to this whole mess in the first place, the half that egged him on whenever the other half of his brain was saying that even so much as touching Brian wasn’t allowed, wanted to see where he could push this to next. 

Brian introduced them all to Jonah, his band- and roommate, and Laura, his sister and, from what Pat could tell, accomplice in many mischievous activities.

“Laura, this is Pat Gill. Not to be confused with Patrick Gilbert.”

Laura shook his hand with the same bubbly energy that Brian typically gave off. “God, Brian, couldn’t you have made friends with, like, a -- a Tap?”

Brian laughed. Pat’s heart spun. 

“A Tap, geez, Laura, was that the furthest -- god, was that the furthest thing you could think of to a Pat?”

Laura giggled back at him. “Brian, I have been cleaning up after slime projects all day and my brain’s a bit fried, maybe give me a break.” She turned to Pat. “Our brother’s also --”

“Also a Pat, yeah, I’ve uh, I’ve heard.” Brian sent him a quick smile. “Slime?” he managed. 

Laura rolled her eyes. “God, yeah, I nanny, and there’s this new way that my kid figured out how to make extra-crunchy slime with --”

“I’m sorry,” Brian said, bursting out laughing, “_crunchy_?” 

They continued on like that for a bit, teasing each other and making puns, and Pat could only stand there, laughing with them, heart stuttering in place. After a bit, Brian grabbed his hand apologetically.

“Listen, Pat, me and Laura and Jonah and some other Polygon peeps are going to my place after this for an after party-ish thing, and you’re coming, right?”

Pat had to fucking stop thinking so goddamn much. 

“Sure.”


	2. you go down smooth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which pat simultaneously does and does not want so, so much

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes i changed the tense and didn't realize until halfway through, my bad! ignore it if you can.
> 
> also, i probably should wait til i have more to post this, but like, instant gratification, amirite?

Pat contemplates going home and changing again, contemplates going home and staying home, contemplates going out of New York, hah, altogether. 

He doesn’t, though. He doesn’t feel like dissecting shit tonight, and so he takes an thirty extra seconds in Brian’s staircase to get himself together, and by the time he gets there, he’s ready to just, like, get stupid tipsy and hang out with his friends.

The door opens on an already-somewhat-drunk Brian. 

“Patrick Gill,” he announces, like just Pat isn’t enough. 

Pat grins. “Brian David Gilbert.”

“Come in, my good sir,” Brian says, half-bowing, opening the door a little wider. 

“Why thank you, my liege,” Pat says, returning the half-bow and the bad British accent. 

“What the fuck even is a liege?” 

Pat laughs as he walks into the house after Brian, taking in the rap music and slight differences from the last time he was there. “No fucking clue, Brian. Uh, the person in charge?”

“Ooooh,” Brian says, turning around and waggling his eyebrows. “Then that’s _definitely_ me.”

“God, Brian,” Pat groans.

They walk further into the apartment, and Pat waves to Simone and Laura and Allegra and everyone else there, all of whom are drinking and dancing and talking. There’s a couple people he recognizes from Brian’s Instagram, friends from college, maybe, and lots of people he doesn’t know, and more work people. The music is even louder here, and Brian beatboxes a little to it, which is -- which is something Pat thinks he really should be used to, this insane talent popping out from basically nowhere. 

Brian turns around once they’re sufficiently in the room. “Dance with us, Pat Gill?”

Pat swallows. “Sure, but I’m, uh --”

“Not a dancer,” Brian finishes. “I know. Tonight, you are.” He grabs Pat’s hand and pulls him towards the rest of the party. Pat follows, because it’s Brian, and what else can he fucking do. 

Then the song changes to “Bulletproof,” which Pat recognizes, and Brian stops too quick, and turns around, and he’s still tugging on Pat’s hand, and they bump a little, and Pat hopes he doesn’t notice how fucking red Pat’s ears are, and grabs his other hand, and starts doing what Pat can only describe as _boogying_. 

“God, I love La Roux. Laura did a dance to this song once, and it was, like, _stupid_ cool. She also loves the Pomplamoose version of it. Have you listened to that?” Pat shakes his head no, smiling, _enraptured_. “Gotta say, it’s a bop,” Brian says before spinning him. It’s a little awkward, but they pull it off.

“Been there, done that, messed around, I’m havin’ fun, don’t put me down,” Brian sings softly at Pat, getting closer than -- and, jesus christ, this is --

Brian pulls away suddenly, eyes wide. “Oh shit, Pat! I forgot to ask you what you want to drink!”

“All good,” Pat says, which are, apparently, the magic words to get Brian to keep on dancing very close to him. 

“Pat Gill, what do you want?” Brian says, very close to Pat’s neck. 

_What do you want?_ Nothing. Everything. God, he just -- he just -- 

Pat swallows. “Beer’s fine.” 

+++

The party is good. Like, really good, Brian’s clearly good at throwing parties, and it makes him want to go to parties at Brian’s house more often. Makes him wish he’d have taken him up on it the last couple times he’s invited Pat to one. He’s only been to Brian’s house once, to drop him off after a work thing, and it’s cute. More homey than his. Probably what comes from living with your best friend since freshman year and your sister. 

Anyways. Party’s good. Pat gets drunk and a little high and dances and doesn’t flirt with Brian but doesn’t _not_ flirt and sings along when he can and, just, generally has a good time leaving his brain at home for once. 

Nothing too eventful happens at the party, but it does something to his and Brian’s relationship in the way that seeing anyone drunk does. They touch more often, bumping hips in line for coffee during work breaks and messing with each others’ hair and hugging goodbye. They spend time outside of work together, which starts as just post-Gill-and-Gilbert dinner and then weekends doing work stuff together and then just, like, _hanging out_ at each other’s houses. 

They’re more comfortable around one another, too, and Pat notices that Brian’s shoulders are more relaxed around him, and he notices himself sharing more and more of himself with Brian. Little things, like about his personal life and his old relationships and his childhood. 

It feels good. 

+++

It feels especially good when Brian brings up an idea for a Gill and Gilbert where they pick each other up and then _mount_ each other whenever they climb a monster in Shadow of the Colossus. Well, it also feels terrifying and awful, and like a dangerous slippery slope of an idea, just a fuckin’ slip-n-slide of a concept, but it _also_ sounds really good. Really, really good.

When Brian suggests the idea, he doesn’t look at him for most of it. Picks at his cuticles, fidgets with his phone. When he does look at Pat, specifically when he says the word _mount_, he does a thing with his eyebrows and the corners of his mouth to indicate that yes, he knows what this all sounds like, and that he’s leaning into it, and that maybe Pat could too, if he wanted. And then Pat makes three innuendos in the space of twenty seconds and Brian chokes on his coffee in a way that says, _yes, exactly, perfect_, and so they pitch it to Tara and start downloading the game.

+++

Brian doesn’t shut up during the whole stream.

To be fair, the kid literally never shuts up normally, but this is -- 

Or, maybe it’s just because Pat’s concentrating too hard on not dropping Brian and also not getting an erection that he doesn’t talk, and while he’s used to the silence, Brian isn’t, and so he fills in the gaps, because he’s a nervous talker like that, and also has never run out of things to say once in his life.

Brian’s also totally fucking _breathless_ the whole time. Like, eyes-popping-out-of-his-head, can’t-keep-still, every-other-word-out-of-his-mouth-is-_geez_-and-_wowie_ type of breathless. And it almost feels like --

Or, maybe it’s just because the game is damn hard normally, not to mention when you’re also trying not to fall and turning your head a weird way, and Brian was already having a very caffeine-fueled sort of day, and so everything takes a little extra effort. 

Brian also is extremely giggly, and keeps calling him Pat Gill, and _geez_-ing and _wowie_-ing all over the place, and says the words _Pat’s good thighs_, and it’s just that sometimes it --

Or, Pat’s reading way, way too much into everything, because it’s easier to focus on that than how fucking fast his heart’s beating, and doesn’t fucking know what he wants or what’s real anymore because his brain’s been turned into ground beef. 

+++

Brian pinches his shoulder while Pat’s packing up his stuff for the day and asks, “Thai?” and it takes him a second to process that Brian’s asking him if he wants Thai food for dinner and not that he’s saying hi to him weirdly. 

Pat straightens up. “Not really feeling dinner tonight. Sorry.”

Brian -- fucking deflates, pretty much, right in front of him. 

“God, right, sorry, listen, that wasn’t -- I know that was maybe a little much, but it seemed like --” he shakes his head and runs his hand through his hair, as if untangling invisible knots around him. “Sorry. If I, like, overstepped, during the stream. Or something. I’d never want you feeling uncomfortable ‘cuz of me.”

Pat breathes out. “Jesus, Brian, _no_, this was all in -- all in good fun. I’m fine, I’m just...that took a lot out of me, and I kinda wanna just -- just curl up in bed for a bit.”

Brian looks down at his boots. They’re cute, with just a bit of a heel, and Pat wishes for a second that he could pull them off. If he said that out loud, Brian would probably say, _jeez, Pat, of course you could pull them off_, and Pat would say something about being too old and uncool, and --

“No, yeah, totally. Phew, that’s good, all in good fun, glad you’re -- glad it’s -- _all in good fun_, and all that,” Brian says, looking back up at him. 

“Sorry.”

“All good, Pat, I should probably hang out with Jonah more, he’s been gettin’ all -- all, woeful, recently, sad that you’re stealing me from him.” 

Pat laughs. “Sounds good. See you Monday?”

“Yeah, Pat Gill. See you Monday.”

+++

It also feels more like friendship than anything else, sometimes, especially after that goddamn stream.

Which is fine. It really is fine, because Pat doesn’t have a whole ton of friends in New York, and Brian’s so fucking cool and hip and young and smart and funny that any way Pat gets to be in his life is totally fine with him. 

Pat sets up a date with a guy from Grindr -- well, first, he actually gets Grindr, and knows enough to put in his bio that he wants actual dates instead of just hookups (which, he does want that too, but also is a sap who _likes_ real dates, like a lot). He wears a nice button-down that strangers on the internet seem to like because it shows off his biceps, and Simone helps him pick out a place. 

They go out to a suprsingly facy gay bar, one with wine and cheese. and Pat’s got enough gay friends to have been to several before, and the guy is really, really nice. Like, so kind, and Pat’s a little nervous but it goes pretty well, apart from the mouse that jumps on his date’s arm halfway through, but his date just laughs it off and suggests they just get hot dogs and walk around instead. 

It’s nice, to have someone to laugh with and compliment him and hold his hand and be impressed by him.

They don’t go on a second date, though, and Pat’s -- well, he’s not upset, exactly. More upset that he’s _not_ upset, actually.

He considers mentioning it to Brian, but ends up accidentally talking about it in a Gill and Gilbert first instead. They’re talking about rats, because it’s the Warhammer II Vermin Tide stream and there are lots of rats, and he’s a little sick and delirious, and so he brings it up without thinking.

“I was out on a date uh, last weekend,” he says, heart pounding, because, _fuck_, this is happening now, isn’t it, “and I was in a, uh, wine bar,” and what if he accidentally outs himself or something, _better be careful, Pat_, “in the lower east side of Manhattan, a bar that I will not name” (since someone is bound to recognize it and connect the dots, aren’t they) “since I’m -- since I’m saving it for my Yelp review of the place,” he finishes, letting Brian help him with the goof. 

He keeps the mouse story gender-neutral, but in a way that doesn’t seem obvious, and they move on to talking about Laura again (god, every time he hangs out with Laura he’s more and more convinced that she and Brian are really twins, and also that she’s one of his favorite people ever), and it’s fine, and when Brian asks him about the date later, he does two maybe-stupid things.

“So what was she like, then? Cool enough for a second date?”

Pat could -- well, he’s got a couple options, and not a lot of time to make a decision. Fuck it. 

“He was.” The first word is a truth and the second is a lie and it’s probably the most conflicting set of sentiments anyone has ever packed into a two-word sentence before. 

Brian goes still, for approximately one second, because that’s all the stillness he’s got in him, and then his eyes go all wide, and he smiles widely like he’s just won at Mario Kart. 

“That’s great, Pat Gill, geez, I’m so gosh-darn happy for you, I --”

Pat’s flustered Brian, which. Fucking _how_? With the gay thing? With the date thing? And why the _fuck_ is Brian so happy about this, what’s inspired all the fake-swearing and Pat Gill-ing? 

“-- seriously, that’s fantastic, Pat.”

“Uh huh.” 

They stand there, staring at each other, Brian bouncing on the tips of his toes, and Pat is just -- god, why can’t he tell the truth, jesus _christ_, and what’s Brian being so weird about, and, fuck, if he doesn’t break this weird-ass tension right now he’s going to die on the spot. “Pizza?”

“Pizza’s real good, Pat,” Brian’s saying, still smiling, but also there’s something just a little off about it. “Pizza’s real good.”

+++

Two weeks later, Brian asks as nonchalantly as he is physically capable of about the second date. 

“Eh, he hated High School Musical,” Pat lies. 

Brian grins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> y'all make my heart sing, seriously. i'm havin' fun (don't put me down)!
> 
> if you want to: listen to the pomplamoose version of bulltetproof, then "you go down smooth" by lake street dive in order to get the full experience of this chapter. sorry it's a short-ish one


	3. can you tell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which Pat’s just plain dumb, a little bit, but also who isn’t and also he’s got good reason to be.

Brian comes out to him via joke, in the end, because of course he does.

Pat learns later that Brian’s out to his whole family and all his friends and basically anyone who asks, because he’s Brian and it’s impossible for him to keep that sort of thing under wraps. 

But like. Again. How was Pat supposed to ask about that?

Anyways. They’re filming something long with just him and Brian and Clayton, and it’s been nearly six hours at this point (Pat got to work way, way earlier than he wanted to this morning, but Brian requested it because he was antsy about the video he wanted to make, and it’s lesson number two thousand in how Pat will do anything for Brian), and Brian has a line where he’s supposed to wink at Pat (who’s off-camera) and it kills Pat every single time, and the camera won’t. Fucking. Focus. 

Pat messes with it, and Clayton messes with it, and Brian messes with it, and Pat messes with it again, and it _still_ won’t focus, and there’s no fucking _reason_ why it won’t focus, why doesn’t it just _focus_. 

After twenty minutes of messing with it, Clayton goes out to get a new lens and Pat starts drinking his second Red Bull and Brian messes with his hair, looking beyond exasperated. “Jesus,” he groans, as he starts cleaning his glasses. “Biphobia at its finest.”

Pat does an honest-to-God spit take. 

Brian shoots him a look. “What?”

“Nothing. It’s just that, uh,” _Pat stop talking stop talking stop talking_, “I didn’t know that you, uh, that you were, uh.” If Pat doesn’t stop saying “uh” Brian’s gonna think he’s either biphobic or even more of a dumbass than he actually is.

“Bi?”

“Uh. Yeah.”

Brian laughs, and it’s such a nice change of pace from the frustrated state he’s been in for the past -- well, couple hours, honestly -- that Pat has to remind himself to breathe. 

“Yup. Internet’s whack, but it’s also correct about me ‘n’ Simone’s _chaotic bi energy_, or whatever.” He looks proud, and also a little blushy, and like he’s forgotten about the fuckin’ lens (god, the goddamn lens). “And, uh, yours too, I guess.”

“Oh, uh, m’not, uh. Bi.” 

Brian cocks his head. “Oh! My bad, Pat, I just -- you mentioned a date, and I figured, because of the ex-wife -- but probably I just, like, misheard? Or something? With the date? Sorry, I --”

“Brian, no, it’s, uh -- we -- my ex and I, we -- broke up because, uh -- because I’m gay.” Pat thinks that maybe he’s getting a little worse at coming outs, if that’s possible

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

Brian looks like he’s thinking about starting to tap dance, which, Pat learned at a rousing game of Jackbox at a kickback at Brian’s a couple weeks before, he’s very good at. And the excitement’s probably just from the excitement of having another Polygon Queer (_tee em_) that he can joke around with, but still. 

“Guess it’s just plain homophobia then, the lens bullshit.”

Pat laughs. 

Brian looks like he really might break out into dance, and include a song, even. 

Pat feels like he might join in, maybe.

+++

Brian invites him over for video games a couple nights later.

Which -- it should be innocuous, and it usually is. Usually, he’ll go over, or Brian will go to his house, and they’ll get a little high (_What the hell, Pat, how the fuck are you so god at rolling joints_, Brian had said to him, once, and after that Pat tried to show off as much as possible) and he’ll get some solid laughs out of Brian, and try not to stare at him too much, and touch him just as much as to not be weird but not so much that it’s, well, weird, and maybe crash on the couch if he needs to, and ignore everything his body is telling him to do. Innocuous. Simple.

But the way Brian says it this time, it’s like --

Ever since Pat told him about the date, and the subsequent faux-breakup -- and Pat’s fully aware that he could be making this up, probably _is_ making it all up, probably it’s all in his head -- Brian’s been a little -- jumpier, or something. Quicker to compliment him, or tease him, or poke his sides jokingly. 

For the first time, Pat lets himself delve just a little bit into the pool of _maybe_, and it’s a terrifying, wild pool, and he only really dips his toe in, but it’s still -- it’s a hell of a lot better than the pool of _never_. 

And also worse. Also so, _so_ much worse. 

Anyways. Brian invites him to video games at his house, and Pat brings the joints, and gets there only five minutes late, and Brian gives him a hug that goes straight to his ears. 

“Hey, I was thinking -- what if we do something competitive tonight?” Brian suggests.

Normally, they play something collaborative and simple -- Cuphead, or Overcooked, or once, even, Water Boy and Lava Girl. God, that had been a night and a half, the two of them high and nostalgic and huddled up in front of a computer giggling, and Pat’s heart just fucking _racing_ with the intimacy of it. 

“Sure. Mario Kart?”

“Uh,” Brian says, walking over to the TV cabinet to pick out whatever game he has in mind and letting Pat settle in on the couch. “What about Dark Souls?”

“Yeah, whatever’s good with me. You sure, though? I’ve played it a hell of a lot more than you have,” he says as Brian moves back to sit next to Pat. “This won’t be frustrating?”

“Nah,” Brian smiles. “I like a challenge,” he says, turning his whole body towards Pat and, jesus christ, _winking_. 

Pat’s palms are just so, so goddamn sweaty, jesus _christ_, and he doesn’t at all know what to do with his mouth aside from listen to the demon in his brain going _kiss him, kiss him, kiss him_. 

Instead, he throws back a, “so I’ve noticed,” and tries not to lean in too much. Brian grins, and it’s honestly obscene. Pat watches as he picks out the most hellish character. “Not one to half-ass this kind of thing, are you,” he says, and Brian turns to face him again.

“I never half-ass anything, Pat Gill,” he says in a low voice, and he’s somehow even closer than he was a second ago, and it takes Pat a second to find a witty enough reply because uh, where the fuck did his brain go? And where the hell is this coming from?

“Jesus, Brian. Are you incapable of whispering?” he says, just to say something, anything.

That earns him a full-on Brian laugh, and he has to honest-to-god close his eyes for a second to regroup himself. 

“All that theater kid stuff, Patrick.”

Pat lets out a laugh. “Got it.” The change in tone is enough to send them back to their original positions on the couch, facing towards the screen, and it feels to Pat like someone’s cut the tension in the room, just enough so that he can breathe again.

But also, his chest is just a little tight for the rest of the night, and he doesn’t have to look to deep inside himself to know why.

+++

Brian wins the first game because Pat’s still thinking about _I like a challenge_ and _I never half-ass anything, Pat Gill_. He loses the second one because he keeps on trying to turn their actions into a song, and in his frustration he ends up just a little bit closer to Pat. He wins the third one because the only thing Pat can focus on the whole time is the place that their knees are touching.

He loses the fourth, but only because he’s too high and giggly and holy hell, Pat has never wanted to _tuck someone into bed_ and then _kiss them on the forehead_ more, and where the hell did that thought come from, and why is that what his brain’s decided is the peak of romance. 

After that, Brian gets sleepy, and offers Pat the bed, and Pat says _no, it’s good, the couch is fine_, and what he wants to say is _only if you’re there too_, only he doesn’t because it’s fucking _way_ too much, isn’t it. 

Instead, he takes the couch, and sends a quick text to Simone.

>_I’m fucked._

He figures she’ll know what it’s about.

Or rather, who. 

+++ 

Brian makes Pat feel stupid, and stupid _good_, and new, and soft, and dirty, and sappy, and sad, and carbonated, and tight, and protective, and like he wants to smother his head in blankets, and like he wants to yell out a car window going ninety miles an hour down a highway, and like he wants to spend a week just kissing Brian’s face, and like he wants to die. 

Then again, several things make him feel like he wants to die, so. 

Maybe this isn’t the end of the world. 

+++

Pat wakes up far too early to a text from Simone, and then groans, because, oh yeah.

>>_finally decided to admit you’ve got a crush on brian, have you?_

Oh, _fuck_ her.

It’s too much, too early, and so Pat goes back to sleep and dreams about rescuing Brian from an asylum full of zombies.

+++

Simone ends up cornering him about it, eventually.

Pat’s okay at making conversation -- can blabber on about whatever if he needs to, or if he’s with people he’s really comfortable with, or if the subject is something more impersonal. He once spent the entire session of a therapy appointment talking about the intersection of Marxism and the beauty industry, and another about the history of violent dance (moshing as some sort of colonized descendant of Capoeira, mainly). He can ramble about video games for work, talk about politics with whoever is willing to listen, give advice to friends if they need it. He can be funny, or serious, or playful, or whatever. And yeah, he stutters over what to say sometimes, and is a little awkward in general, and is much better about written text (research papers were the highlight of his college experience), but he can _talk_, if he needs to.

But talking about feelings? Talking about the intricacies of his Gay (not-quite-anymore) Panic, _tee em_, or the conflicting ways he feels about the (vague, improbably) possibility of Brian being into him, or how he both hates and loves it whenever Brian touches him in any way? In a place where he can maybe be overheard by said Brian, or anyone, really? With Simone, who he knows will get everything out of him and leave him feeling emotionally exhausted, if not less of a confused mess? 

She corners him, at work no less, in the room that they keep for shooting things that need a specific background that no one ever really needs, and tells him he better spill or she might just give him a four-hour Hemingway lecture until he relents. 

Honestly, he’d almost rather be subjected to the lecture.

“Fine,” he finally groans, and ignores the smirk on her face as they sit on the floor. She plugs in her phone at the outlet in between them as he prepares what he wants to say.

(Honestly, it feels a little bit like what he imagined girl sleepovers were like when he was younger, and it opens him up just the right about).

“So. I’ve had, like -- I’ve had crushes before, obviously, I know what it’s like to want to just fuck someone or to be curious about what dating them would feel like, but this feels -- this feels like --” he shoves his hands into his face “-- god, I have no idea. Like, I love being best friends with him, and I love how I feel around him, and obviously I’ve got that dumb crush on him, but also, I hate it, because it’s too much, and every little thing that feels like it could be pushing it feels like -- like, you know when you’re eating too many fuckin Doritos and you know you’re not gonna be able to stop but eating them anyways just -- just cuz it feels good, and I don’t wanna compare Brian to Doritos because fuckin obviously he’s a _person_ and that’s objectifying, but --”

“But you want to eat him?”

Pat lets out a laugh that’s only _just_ more laugh than sob, but it’s enough.

Simone smiles at him. “I’ve been there, Pat. Gay feels are gay feels. I’ve had my fair share of _what the fuck is this feeling and why does it feel good and bad at the same time and how do I stop it and does she feel the same about me_, and it fuckin’ _sucks_, dude.”

Pat fidgets with the buttons on his shirt. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s -- that’s pretty spot on, Simone, _fuck_.”

“Do you want...advice? Or, like, a shoulder to cry on? Or to talk through it? Encouragement? A distraction? Something else entirely? Nothing?”

Pat ponders for a second. “Advice, I think. Dunno if there’s much more to talk about.”

“I can do that,” she says, grinning. “First off, maybe consider that he could be into you, too. It’s not outside the realm of possibility, here."

“Simone,” Pat groans. “You absolutely cannot do that to me. Jesus, Simone, if I spend any time _considering_ it’s gonna get into my head and fuck up shit even more.” It already kinda sorta has, but he doesn't tell her that.

Simone holds up her hands like, _okay, I’ll stop_. “Fine. But at the very least, consider that he’s not gonna do that Black Mirror block-a-person-in-real-life thing to you if he finds out you’ve got feelings for him. Okay? Worst case scenario, you tell him, it’s weird, you go back to normal in a few weeks, you teach your brain to shut it down, bada bing bada boom, you’re over it. But the longer you go without saying anything, the worse it’ll be.” Simone -- hah -- pats him. “I promise.”

“Thanks, Simone.”

“What I’m here for.” She stands up, and holds out a hand to help him up too. “You gonna be okay?”

He grabs it, the knots in his stomach less tangled than they’d been the night before.

“Think so.”

“Good. Let’s get drinks sometime and I can tell you all about my best friend crush from college that ended disastrously.”

Pat laughs. “Perfect.”

+++

“Hey, uh, I was thinking,” Brian asks him one Friday after work, while Pat puts away the props they’d been using. “Would you wanna go out and do something tomorrow? Go do something touristy, maybe? Or...something?"

“Oh! Perfect, yeah,” Pat says, unplugging his phone and wrapping up the charger. “Simone and I were gonna hang, but yeah, we can totally do something with you."

Brian drops the pen he’s holding and goes to pick it up, looking like he’s in pain for just a second. “Yeah! Totally, invite Simone. That sounds good. I can, like, invite Laura or something too, make it a double -- double hang-out, or something, I know she’s free tomorrow and she and Simone got along well at my last thing.”

“Great! We can, uh, start with lunch at that pizza place you like near mine and circle up from there?”

The “circle up” comment is directly engineered to make Brian laugh, and Pat is rewarded with a short Brian giggle. “Sounds good, Pat Gill. Five? Or, here, I’ll tell you five but get there at five-thirty so that you can plan for later.”

Pat laughs. “Okay, fuck you, I was on time to Allegra’s thing last week.”

“Yeah, but you said ‘hewwo’ when you first walked in, so we gotta scrap it. Doesn’t count anymore.”

“Sowwy? What’s that? I said hewwo? Was I a -- a _bad boy_, Bwian?”

“I’m gonna actually kill you, Pat.” Brian’s laughing, though, so it’s worth it. “See you tomorrow, unless I come murder you in your sleep for pronunciation crimes.”

“See you then, Bwian,” he says, which earns him the finger from Brian as he walks out the door.

+++

When Pat tells Simone about the plan for the next day after Brian leaves, she very nearly slaps him.

“Patrick fucking Gill, that was a chance to go on a date with Brian, your crush of -- what is it, almost six fucking months now -- and you passed it up because _we already had plans_?”

“Jesus, Simone, stop _yelling_, it’s not a fucking _date_, he just wanted to hang out! He’s gonna bring his sister, it wasn’t a date.”

“Did he _lead_ with ‘hey Pat, want to hang out with me and my sister tomorrow?’ Or did--”

“No.”

“--he only bring that up when you mentioned me?” she finishes, groaning. “_God,_ Patrick, that was -- Pat, I’m gonna kill you.”

“It wasn’t a date, Simone. I promise.”

She smacks his shoulder with her sweater paw. “Well _now_ it isn’t!”

“I was just -- but we had plans --”

“I know,” she sighs. “I get it. It’s fine, I’ll go, Laura’s lovely, we can hang out and conspire about you two and everything.”

“Simone, don’t you fucking -- there will be absolutely zero fucking conspiring, or else -- Simone, please do not talk to Laura about my dumb crush.”

She smiles, and it’s wicked, and he swears it’s a look she’s stolen straight off his older sister’s face. “I make no promises, Pat Gill."

He groans, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his palms. “I’m gonna kill you, Simone. First, I’m gonna kill you, and then I’m gonna kill myself.”

“Aha!” Simone says, pointing a finger dramatically at him. “So you admit it! You _do_ realize it was supposed to be a date.”

Pat smiles wickedly. “I make no promises, Simone.”

+++

The day is -- stellar, honestly, couldn’t have gone more smoothly. Pat gets to be around one of his favorite versions of Brian the whole day -- goofy and talkative, but not overly performative, because he’s around the people he’s most comfortable with. Since there are other people, Pat also doesn’t feel like he has to analyze every single move he makes around Brian, which is a bonus. And despite the nagging feeling that maybe this could have been something more if he’d have let it, Pat has a good time. 

Well, aside from all the whispering and that Simone and Laura do. That, he could do without.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> uh, let's not think too deeply about timelines, here. time's an illusion, it's fine, don't worry about it. however, e3 is definitely Coming Up.
> 
> also, i don't know anything about video games. sorry. do you win in dark souls? if not, pretend it's something you can win at.


	4. (i gotta have) faith

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which Pat feels many, many things, and discusses them more than usual
> 
> tw: anxiety talk

E3 is -- god, it’s a blur, and Pat’s a mess, and he didn’t know he could feel that many emotions in that short amount of time.

His emotions tend to be slow to change -- he’s the sort of person who gets songs stuck in his head for days, weeks at a time. Who meanders through games, trying to experience as much as possible. Who finishes his food last. Who isn’t afraid to take his damn time. 

When he first met Brian, he got stuck on panic for a long time, and then just a general sense of “oh fuck” mixed with...shame? Frustration? Something else he didn’t feel like spending time pinpointing? Which eventually turned into acceptance, and then something almost giddy, sometimes. _That’s just the five stages of grief, basically_, he tells himself, but oh well. Feelings are hard to control, he knows. 

Anyways. E3 seems to bring every emotion he’s ever had to the forefront. Pat ends up sleeping for nearly sixteen hours when he gets back because of the emotional exhaustion.

When he relays it all to his therapist, later, he starts with the streams: dancing with Brian to Paula Abdul as they gave a shitty tour of their nightmare Air BnB, walking around E3 with the world’s jankiest streaming getup, slipping easily into the Pat Gill persona he’d perfected for the internet. Being on camera is usually mostly easy, now that he’s learned to trick himself into forgetting that millions of people watching, but sometimes he has flashes of uncomfortable self-awareness that render him totally dissociated for a minute or five. 

He remembers talking to Brian about it, at the event, this performance anxiety.

+++

“I get it,” Brian had said, and he’d scoffed (he thinks maybe it’s the first time he’s scoffed at something before, but the noise comes out anyways). 

“Brian, no offense, but there’s no way you, Mr. Ham-It-Up, is nervous about this shit. I’ve seen you perform.”

“Okay, maybe it’s not, like, exactly the same,” he’d answered, examining his nail polish, “but I’m a constant ball of anxiety otherwise. You know that.”

“What d’you, uh, get most anxious about?”

Brian had looked up, thinking. “Crowds, mainly. I get overstimulated _real_ quick. Anyone who’s gotten me into bed knows that,” he’d said, grinning at Pat, whose heart had done a strange drumroll. “But like, in public, it can get real bad. Lotsa people, bright lights, too many sounds. Enough of that and it gets hard to pay attention, and then I start dissociating.” He’d gone back to picking at his nails. “I also get nervous about normal stuff, like job interviews or whatever, and I definitely do have those -- those flashes of, like, _oh jeez if I mess up now I’m fucked_, kinda things, when I’m performing -- like, I can’t back out or control my situation and it freaks me out for a second -- but I’m good at powering through. In general, I guess. But mainly it’s the too-many-things-at-once thing that gets me the most.”

Pat had furrowed his brows. “E3 must be hell for you, then.”

Brian had laughed. “Yeah, a little. But mostly I just pick something to focus on real hard and that stops the -- the spiraling of anxiety, and all that. Sometimes I’ll see how much of the Pokerap I can remember and recite it in my head. Shuts up everything else.”

“Grounding exercises,” Pat said, nodding, because he’s talked about those with his therapist a _lot_. 

“Exactly! Grounding.” 

“Anything I can do to help?”

Brian had smiled, softly. “Not much. Sometimes it helps to, like, touch me somehow, remind me I’m not just, like, a floating head, or whatever. Laura used to pinch my shoulder, but hand massages or reminding me to breathe can help.” Pat had been too busy thinking about giving Brian a hand massage that he almost hadn’t heard what Brian had said next. “What about you, Pat?”

“Huh?”

“Anything I can do when you’re lookin’ all -- all tense and anxious?”

“Uh, the breathing thing, for me, too. Distraction, in general. I think I’ve, uh, got the opposite problem to you -- I’m, like, _too_ aware of my body, when I get like that.”

“Makes sense.”

Brian had started fiddling with his glasses, then, and Pat had sworn internally, realizing how much conversations about anxiety make you even more aware of it.

“God, anxiety’s a dick, isn’t it.”

That had made Brian laugh, and Pat had bit his cheek by accident to keep from smiling too wide, and it had been a pain to eat on that side of his mouth for the next few days, but it was worth it. 

+++

He also tells his therapist about the other highlights, and appalls himself with the amount of times he mentions Brian. Sleep deprived and exhausted from arranging all the tech stuff and watching Simone crush Brian and Clayton at Mario Kart. Wondering at Brian’s energy as he runs down the street with half their equipment. Making too-short, far-too-goofy videos that they never end up posting. Being corralled into going to a gay club with Brian and Simone one night, and getting drunk off of terrible tequila sunrises and Brian’s dancing. Watching Brian’s face as the anxiety melts off and is replaced by wonder throughout the conference. Laughing with Clayton as Brian yells about Ridley for six minutes straight -- literally, _yells_ \-- and then lies on the grass for another twenty-five minutes because he’s so overwhelmed. 

“You good down there, bud?” he asks, eventually, leaning over Brian so he’s blocking the gross (terrible, awful, evil) Southern California sun (on the one hand, the dry heat is absolutely ridiculous; on the other, Brian’s _legs_). 

“Pat,” he says, raspy, reverently, blissfully. “Ridley's in Smash.”

Pat just snorts and joins him for a little while on the grass, laying down and pointing out which clouds look like butts and various Pokemon and dicks. Brian doesn’t laugh, exactly, because it’s too painful, apparently, but when he turns his head to grin at Pat a few times, Pat feels like he’s back on the airplane again, floaty and light and out of control. 

+++

His therapist gets an extra big kick out of Pat telling her about their personality quiz conversation.

It had started with Simone groaning at him for being such a goddamn _Leo_ (what he was doing, he doesn’t remember), and then Brian had said that really, he figured it was because Pat was an introvert, and Clayton going, “Actually, you’re all wrong. It’s because he’s a five.”

“Agreed, but I don’t see what that has to do with his personality,” Simone had quipped, grinning at him. 

“Nah, he’s way higher,” Brian had reassured. “Have you _seen_ him in a button down?”

Pat had felt his cheeks going red. 

Clayton had clarified that he meant a _type_ five, on the Enneagram, which was apparently his favorite personality test. “The investigator,” he’d explained. “Notices everything, really smart, very internal. Innovative, hold themselves to a high standard. They like to know everything so they can feel safe. Here,” he’d said, pulling up a page on his phone about it. 

Pat read the description, and then read it again. _Fuck_. He'd felt like he’d gotten whiplash from how accurate it was. 

“Pat?” Brian had asked. 

“Holy _shit_ y’all, I just got pegged and -- and fuckin’ _roasted_ by a personality test,” he’d said, running a hand through his hair. 

“Here,” Clayton had said, taking the phone back and going to a new website. “Take the test for real, lemme know what you get while we set up Mario Kart.”

He’d gotten a five, obviously, because Clayton was never wrong. “Okay,” he’d said, when the others asked for a description. “This is spooky. ‘People of this personality type essentially fear that they don't have enough inner strength to face life, so they tend to withdraw, to retreat into the safety and security of the mind where they can mentally prepare for their emergence into the world’” he’d read out. “‘Fives are often a bit eccentric; they feel little need to alter their beliefs to accommodate majority opinion, and they refuse to compromise their freedom to think just as they please. The problem for Fives is that while they are comfortable in the realm of thought, they are frequently a good deal less comfortable when it comes to dealing with their emotions, the demands of a relationship--’” he’d choked here, for just a second -- “‘or the need to find a place for themselves in the world. Fives tend to be shy, nonintrusive, independent and reluctant to ask for the help that others might well be happy to extend to them.’” 

“_Jesus_, Pat Gill, what a fuckin’ _read_,” Brian had laughed, astonished. “Smart, doesn’t ask for help, don’t change their opinions -- that’s you all over, Patrick.”

“The bit about having a hard time with emotions, too,” Simone had added. 

“I wanna read,” Brian had said, grabbing the phone from Pat. He’d scrolled for a bit. “Awwww, Pat! Fives ‘are often devoted friends and life long companions,’ very true!” He’d scrolled a bit more, taking a short sharp breath at one point. “Jeez. ‘Fives are usually somewhat restrained when it comes to emotional expression, but they often have stronger feelings than they let on.’ What are you keeping from us, Pat?”

Simone had raised her eyebrow at him. “Yes, Pat, what _are_ you keeping from us?”

_Oh, fuck you, Simone_.

“That I think it’s your turn to take this test, Simone.”

Simone had ended up with a three, the Achiever, which she’d nicknamed the “Business Bitch.” Clayton had talked about his type a little, and explained about directions of stress and growth, and wings, and levels of development, while Brian took his test. 

“So basically, it’s just telling you your basic fears and basic desires, and how those might interact with the way you view the world and act and work with others and everything. Your stress direction is where you move if you get stressed, obviously, and your wing is whichever type on either side of you has more of an influence on your personality. So, like, Simone’s got a two wing, which means she’s also got some of that empathy and motherly nature of a two. And you’ve got a four wing,” he’d said, indicating at Pat, who had sat down on the edge of the couch, next to Brian, “which gives you that creative edge instead of a more scientific one. Levels of development tell you how how healthy you are and where you might need to grow. So, more healthy threes are aware that success doesn’t equal money or fame, and all that.”

Pat had nodded, pulling up some research on his own phone. Eventually, Brian had finished the test. 

“Wowie, Pat, you were fuckin’ right, that _is_ a roast.”

“What are you?” Simone had asked. 

“Oh, right. Four. Here,” he’d said, tossing the phone to Simone so she could read it. Pat pulled up type four on his own phone, reading through it quickly. 

_People of this personality type tend to build their identities around their perception of themselves as being somehow different or unique; they are thus self-consciously individualistic_, he’d read, skimming the wall of text. _Fours are emotionally complex and highly sensitive. They long to be understood and appreciated for their authentic selves, but easily feel misunderstood and unappreciated... They are emotionally centered and spend much of their lives immersed in their internal mental landscapes, where they feel free to cultivate and analyse their feelings. A desire to manifest this internal world often leads Fours to an interest in the arts, and some do become actual artists. Whether artistic or not, however, most Fours are aesthetically sensitive and concerned with self-expression and self-revelation, whether it be in the clothes they wear or in the overall nature of their often idiosyncratic lifestyles_. 

“This is just calling you an artsy try-hard hipster,” Pat had said, “with good fashion sense.”

Brian had laughed. “Jeez, yeah, you could put it that way. And the --”

“Shhh, not done reading,” Simone had interrupted. 

“Is this bit true?” Pat had said, quieter, and turned his own phone to face Brian.

_Fours are somewhat melancholic by disposition, and under stress tend to lapse into depression. They also tend to be self-absorbed, even under the best of circumstances, but when unbalanced, easily give way to a self-indulgence which they perceive as being fully justified as a way to compensate for the general lack of pleasure they experience in their lives. Rather than look for practical solutions to their difficulties, Fours are prone to fantasizing about a savior who will rescue them from their unhappiness._

“The bit about being self-absorbed? God, yeah, when I’m at my most vulnerable that’s, like, my worst fear. I’m pretty much always worried that I’m being too focused on myself.”

“Jesus, Brian. That’s harsh. I meant the bit about wanting a miracle solution instead of wanting to look for practical ways to do things.”

“Oh!” Brian had said, running a hand through his hair. “Guess so, sometimes. Though I think I’m pretty good about looking for ways to do things myself.”

“I think so, too,” Pat had said. 

“Ooooo,” Simone had said, handing the phone back to Clayton. “Are there compatibility summaries?”

Pat had tried to kill her with his eyeballs. It didn’t work. 

“Yeah, here, let me pull them up. I did it with my ex girlfriend and it literally predicted the argument we had that ended things. Was weirdly specific...okay, here it is! Who do we start with? It works for friendships, too, although you have to kind of tweak the wording.”

“Let’s do me and you,” Simone had suggested. “Pat can pull up him and Brian.”

“Sounds good,” he’d said, typing. “Oh! Disclaimer, though, there’s not, like, a best relationship or worse relationship. It mostly depends on how healthy you are in your type and how much work you do to recognize the others’ style of communication and connection. Think of it more like examples of how good or bad it could be, depending on how much you put into it.”

“Got it,” Brian had said, grabbing Pat’s phone out of his hands. “God, you do this so slow. Here, lemme...”

“You have a phone, Brian,” he’d said, which had earned him a glance that said, _sue me, Pat Gill_, and a poke in the ribs. 

He’d let Brian work out how to get to their combination, and then took the phone back, letting Brian read over his shoulder, chin mashing into his shoulder bones. 

They read for a while, meshed into each other, and he could feel Brian smile every once in a while. He’d startled when Brian let out a laugh. “Sorry,” he’d explained, “but: ‘Each type usually brings a noteworthy sense of humor and love of the bizarre and the outlandish that can give their relationship a quirky and unique character all of its own.’ That’s literally Gill and Gilbert.”

Pat had grinned. “Yeah, guess so.” He'd read a bit further. “And this: ‘Both inspire creativity in the other and give permission to the other to be themselves and follow their own inspirations.’”

“Gosh, Pat Gill, I’ve always wanted to follow my dream of drinking mystery liquids on live twitch stream. Thanks for taking me there.”

“Don’t forget -- don’t forget harming our bodies with food crimes”

Brian had laughed. “Yeah, that too.”

They’d read through the rest of their combinations, laughing at the true bits, awww-ing at the sweet ones, grimacing at the more unpleasant ones. 

(“Dunno if I know you well enough to become, uh, ‘cool and distant, impersonal and analytic, tinged with resignation and cynicism’ towards you, Clayton,” Pat had said.

Clayton had laughed at that.)

Brian, though, got weird and quiet throughout the evening, and it wasn’t until they were going to bed (in the same room, because Clayton had complained that that bed hurt his back and maybe switching with Pat would help, and because the universe hated Pat) that he’d opened up a little.

“Do you actually think that I’m a, uh, bottomless pit of emotional needs that drains your time and energy?” he’d said, once the lights were off and Pat had thought he was pretty much asleep. 

“God! Jesus, fuck, Brian, _no_. If anything, I think you improve my time and energy.”

“All your time?”

“All my time, Brian. Every second I spend with you is --” _heaven, incredible, lovely_ “-- is good.”

“Good.”

They’d been silent for a couple more seconds. 

“Do you think that I don’t talk enough about my feelings?

Brian had laughed, a little. “Sometimes. But it’s not, like, a dealbreaker. You’re talking about ‘em right now, aren’t you?”

“True.”

“Anyways, I think you do feel a lot, and I like being one of the only people to get it out of you. I like that you -- that you trust me, like that. Might be egotistical, but I do. Makes me feel -- special, I guess.”

Pat had smiled, a smile that curled wide around his mouth and settled in his stomach. 

“Good.”

+++

There’s more, of course. Not much more of it sticks in Pat’s already overloaded brain -- pointed looks from Simone here and there, hugs and pictures with the occasional fan, exciting announcements, the odd compliment from Brian that shakes him more than it should. 

The night before they leave, Brian startles Pat with another midnight conversation.

“Pat,” Brian says to the pitch black. “Do you ever feel like you’re trying so hard at something, and it’s going fucking _nowhere_, and you feel like you wanna give up, but you also feel like it might be worth it, in the end, if it does all go according to plan?”

Pat closes his eyes so hard he sees stars. 

“Yeah, Bri. I’ve been there.”

“Should I keep trying?”

“Probably best to, yeah.”

“God. Yeah. Okay, I’ll keep at it.”

Silence.

“Brian?”

“Yeah, Pat?”

“What’s the thing?”

Brian sighs. 

“I think you’ll find out eventually. Or at least, I hope you do.”

It’s enough. 

“Okay.”

“Night, Pat Gill.”

“Night, Brian. Sweet dreams.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter’s just real self indulgent. i got the idea about flirting via enneagrams and couldn’t rest until i’d written it. 
> 
> if you wanna know yours-- https://www.eclecticenergies.com/enneagram/dotest. i think about how i’m such a two literally daily, and i hope it changes your life as much as it has mine. all type quotes are taken directly from this page, except for compatibilities, which I got from here (but I don’t recommend taking the quiz here as I think it charges you money and fuck that)-- https://www.enneagraminstitute.com/the-enneagram-type-combinations


	5. (i wanna be with you) everywhere

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which the tension is so thick you might need a hatchet. at the very least something serrated. just don’t cut yourself, though.

It’s not all pining, and butterflies, and swooning whenever Brian so much as looks at him. They’re friends, first and foremost, and there are times when Pat can tell his brain to pipe down and let him enjoy a weeknight in with Brian, or a stream together, or a weekend spent at his house planning new videos. He’s not all introvert, sometimes, and it’s nice to know that there are still times where can make Brian laugh and be aware that the joy he feels is just the joy of a well-thought-out goof. Nice to feel like there are some moments where he can relax around Brian. 

(And, honestly, if there weren’t, Pat would probably go insane.)

He also, strangely, figures out that he can manage an extremely diluted form of flirting with Brian. It’s definitely an attempt at play-flirting, the kind that is wrapped up in so many layers of irony that it almost feels safe, the sort of thing where he’s so earnest that it comes out joking. Or maybe the other way around, he’s not sure; it’s the kind of thing that straight girls do where they can comment “stunning” with ten heart-eyes emojis on an Instagram post and pose kissing for photos and call each other “girlfriend” and no one bats an eye. The “two bros, chillin’ in a hot tub” kind of thing. Something so real that it starts off unreal and wraps all the way back to real. 

That kind of flirting.

And Brian is oddly okay with it all, even returns his not-flirting with an even more skilled hand. Brian’s good at it, obviously, because he’s good at everything fun. And although it sorta breaks Pat’s heart that there’s potentially no truth to it, no reasoning beyond the fact that it’s fun, it does feel really good to spar like this with him in a way that he hasn’t let himself. Brian’s the one who returns Pat’s (perfectly manufactured) offhand compliment about his glasses one day with, “Glad you like ‘em, Daddy-o” and a whole-ass wink, the one who responds, “Oh, _size queen_, are we,” when Pat comments salaciously on how long his hair’s getting. 

The one who comes up with the script for “New Shoes,” which, objectively, feels like a lesson in undercover flirtation. 

(The memory of Brian leaning against the kitchen counter like he wants to fuckin’ _devour_ him makes Pat hyperventilate for, like, five minutes every time he thinks about it. 

_“Whatcha got on the end of those stems?” _

They’d had to redo that take about ten times because Pat kept almost choking in the background).

Brian’s funny. Brian’s funny, and fun, and incredibly good at getting a laugh out of people, and all the things he says that might sound like flirting to anyone else are just goofs because that’s what Brian’s good at. He jokes around with Jonah, and Simone, and practically everyone else at the office too because _that’s just who he is_. There’s no way he could be into Pat. 

Except that it sort of seems like he might be, at this point.

Once the idea gets into his head, it’s almost impossible to ignore. The comments that might actually have been genuine flirting. The thing Simone insists had been intended to be a date. The fuckin’ eye contact, all the time, radiating with -- with -- something. Something a little outside the lines of friendship. It’s exhausting, pretending that it’s not impossible for Brian to be into him, and honestly -- it’s kinda nice, when he forgets to be stressed about it, to think about the idea of someone as interesting and hilarious and kind as Brian finding his ugly mug attractive. 

Although sometimes, Brian makes him feel like maybe he’s all those things too -- funny and interesting and kind. Attractive, even. 

Laura and Simone do nothing to help with his confusion. Once, he goes over to Brian’s to bake banana bread --

(>>_Please come over, Pat, I have just so many overripe bananas and am so bad at baking, I need your expertise_

>_I don’t have any baking expertise, Brian_

>>_More than I do_

>_Didn’t you live with a baker?_

>>_Just come over, Pat_)

\-- and as he walks in the door, Laura breezes past him with a knowing wink and a, “You kids have fun!” 

And Simone keeps -- keeps hinting at something, asking him if he plans to “do anything about it” almost every time they’re alone together. 

Whatever “it” is. 

It’s terrifying, though, still, somehow. The thought of asking Brian out, or making any sort of move, even when now, he knows that maybe the answer isn’t _what the fuck, Patrick, we’re just friends, stop being a creep, also I’m twenty-four_. 

And also, he doesn’t want Brian to be his Gay Experiment, _tee em_. (_Even though I’ve been on dates with boys before_, a part of him counters. _Even though I know for sure that I like men_). Brian deserves better. 

Because this isn’t something that’s half-assable. There’s no casually dating Brian — maybe if he wasn’t Pat, his best friend and coworker and, _jesus christ_, what has he gotten himself into with this. But maybe not even then -- Brian’s not real big into casual dating, Pat’s noticed. 

_If_ he makes a move, and _if_ it’s reciprocated, it’s very much an all-or-nothing situation. Nothing short of a two-year relationship, probably a moving-in-together thing (_not that you don’t practically already live at his house_, the demon part of Pat’s brain says), at the very least a meet-the-parents sort of deal. Which like. 

What if he changes his mind? And crushes Brian? And fucks up not only their friendship but their whole work life?

So Pat bites his tongue. Even when it seems like maybe this could be going somewhere. Because he doesn’t like ruining things. 

Especially when those things involve the most important person in his life. 

+++ 

In the meantime, Pat stresses about other things. 

Work -- Tara’s pushing him more in some ways but less in others, and it’s messing with his brain, keeping him constantly on edge. Some days, he feels like there’s so much to do, so much riding on just him — Gill and Gilbert, Unraveled scripts, editing bits, that kind of thing — and others, he feels as though everything he enjoyed most about being at polygon is being destroyed. All the series he once found integral to Polygon are being cancelled, and of course it’s because Brian is their cash cow, and it makes sense because he’s brilliant, obviously, but it also makes him worry about the day that the Higher Ups decide that he’s not necessary anymore. No longer useful. About to be to a fuckin’ farm or some shit — literal or otherwise. 

(Brian’s stressed too, feels the extra pressure even more than Pat does, and his perfectionist ass has to do everything perfectly. Most of their hang-outs (_Remember when these used to be called play-dates?_ Brian fondly muses to him one day as the two of them head to his house after work) are work-centered, which leaves little time for -- anything else, really.)

His parents -- he’s come out to most of his friends and coworkers at this point, not out of some desire to “live his truth” or whatever, he’s a pretty private guy in general, doesn’t feel like he’s keeping secrets. More out of necessity -- correcting them when they ask about girlfriends, reminding them to be more gender neutral when talking about dating in videos, even just bonding over being queer. But his parents, he realizes one morning with a start, still don’t know. It’s been nearly a year since he first told Simone (it feels like much longer) (it also feels like no time at all) and it just -- hasn’t come up, really. 

(Okay, it kind of has. It peripherally has. There have been moments where he could have said something, but it would have been just slightly too far away from the conversation to bring it up without sounding like it was a big deal, and it isn’t, it _isn’t_, he just wants them to know, just in case.)

And now he’s supposed to visit home in a couple weeks for his cousin’s wedding, and they keep bugging him about bringing a date, and Simone had told him she wanted to go with him just for fun but then ended up having plans on that exact date, and so now they’re wondering what girl he’s taking. 

He knows they wouldn’t hate him (they wouldn’t hate him, would they?). He knows they wouldn’t try to kill him, at least. His mom reposted some generic “love everyone” rainbow-covered thing on Facebook the other day, and his dad -- well, his dad worries him, a little, but like, what’s the worst they can do? Disown him? Kick him out of the house he hasn’t lived in for thirteen years? 

Which. Fucking hell, that’s also something he’s stressed about. The main thing, in fact.

Not being kicked out by his parents, obviously, but there’s something up with the water system at his current place, and if his shitty landlord doesn’t figure out what’s wrong and then fix it within the next week they’re all going to have to move out for a few weeks so that they can tear it out and replace it. And, in that case, he would have to find somewhere to live for those weeks. 

It can’t be a motel, because those are expensive, so it’ll have to be someone he knows, except all his friends also live in small shitty apartments with no extra room. He could maybe ask Simone, but he hates to impose on her, she especially loves her space and feels uncomfortable sharing it like that. Or he could go home for those couple weeks, but then he’d have to go back again for the wedding, and aside from being a long-ass time to be around his family for, it’s also a lot of money to go down there twice in such a short period of time. Also, he’s got to think about Charlie, and he doesn’t want to kennel him for that long. (_You could ask Brian_ the demon in his brain says, but, like, wouldn’t that be a disaster.) Or, he could ask -- but no, that would be -- or, maybe his friend -- but that’s too far, and -- and what about -- but he hates cats, and --

His brain races like that for hours at a time, now, and he’s in the midst of a particularly shitty spiral when Brian taps his elbow. 

“Pat?”

“Huh?” he says, shaking out of it.

“Yes or no?”

“Oh, uh,” _fuck_, “wasn’t listening. Say it again?”

“Just asking if you wanted to come over to mine again tonight. Work on the new script.”

“Sorry. Yeah, sounds good.”

“Pat?”

“Yeah?”

“You good?

Pat sighs. “Just, uh, housing shit. Gotta figure out somewhere to live next week, it’s looking like.”

“Pat, I already told you, you can stay with us, Jonah’s gonna be out of town for the next while visiting his family, so it’s even easier for us.”

“Brian, it’s fine, I’ll figure something out. I don’t wanna impose.”

“Literally you wouldn’t even at all, promise. You’re here all the time anyways.” 

Pat makes a face like, _yeah, that’s already an issue_, but Brian doesn’t seem to notice. “What about Charlie?”

“Charlie’d be fine, we can keep him in my room if we need to. Pat. Please. Zuko would be in heaven, he _loves_ you two.”

Pat laughs at that. “Fine. But only ‘cause of Zuko.”  


Brian grins. “Sounds good, Pat Gill. When do you need to be there?”

“Next Sunday.”

“Done.”

Pat lets out a long breath. “I just -- I’m a little worried about --” _about us, about me, about my self-control around you_\--

Brian squeezes his arm. “I know. You’re good, don’t worry.”

Pat nods, at that, decisive. “See you then, then?” If he survives that long.

“See you then.” Brian sends him another reassuring smile. “Well, and also tonight.”

“And also tonight.” 

God. What _the fuck_ is he getting himself into.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *brian voice* welcome to...the timebreak!!
> 
> (seriously, what the fuck is my timeline. pls ignore how wonky it is)
> 
> also this lowkey feels like sacrilege because of how cute brian and karen have been being lately...oops...sorry brian and pat and karen!!


	6. stay open

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which our boys are less dumb than usual and simone's a snake.
> 
> tw for weed usage, just in case!

The eye contact is the worst. 

When Pat finally goes over to Brian’s on Sunday, all his stuff in tow, he’s expecting a weekend of difficulty. Of stopping sentences before they start, of standing just far enough away, of holding his breath. Of keeping his heart in check. 

It’s gonna be the eye contact that truly kills him, though. He’s sure of it now.

The first couple days they have work nonstop, and then suddenly it’s a Wednesday and they’ve gotten as far as they can on the projects they’re working on and have nothing to do but genuinely hang out. Pat chills with Laura and Brian for a while, then Laura’s boyfriend comes over and they all play a new board game, and then suddenly Pat looks up and Laura and her partner are gone and it’s just him and Brian and his thudding heart.

Brian’s uncharacteristically quiet, sitting on the couch cross-legged and picking at the hems of his jeans. 

“Wanna smoke?” Pat asks Brian just to fill in the silence.

Brian grins. “Absolutely, Pat Gill, I always wanna smoke.” His eyes get wide, then, as if he’s just come up with the next sliced bread. “Oh, my gosh, and I have the perfect place to do it, too,” he says, standing up and pulling Pat with him.

Pat smiles conspiratorially. “Have you been keeping a secret rooftop location from me, Brian?”

“You nailed it, Pat.”

Pat gasps exaggeratedly, swooning a little and holding his chest. “Brian, you can’t do this to me. I fuckin’ love rooftop joints. Lemme roll a couple and then let’s go?”

“Sounds good! I’m just gonna, ah --” his voice strains a little as he jams a boot onto his foot from the floor next to them where he’d kicked them off earlier “-- put some warm clothes on and get a couple blankets.”

“Fuckin’ great plan, dude. Let’s do it.”

“One, two, three, let’s jam,” Brian hums, pulling on his other shoe before disappearing into his room. 

Pat puts on his shoes, laughing, and goes to pull out his rolling supplies from the drawer he’s stashed them in. He moves over to the living room coffee table and starts to arrange the supplies in front of him, then takes some weed from his grinder and lines it up in the rolling paper. Still humming the tune Brian had introduced to his brain, he starts rolling, hands moving unconsciously, meditative, practiced in their movements. It’s a while before he notices Brian looking over his shoulder, and when he does he almost throws the half-finished joint he’s working on across the room. 

“Jesus, Brian, how’d you sneak up on me like that?”

“Sorry, Pat Gill. I just...I like watching you roll. You’re so effortless. My clumsy ass can barely pack a pipe without making a mess.”

Pat laughs, still a little shaken, both by Brian’s spookiness and by the nearness of him. His head is turned so that he’s facing Brian, but just barely, and when he moves his focus from Brian’s lips to his eyes, he finds that Brian’s already looking at him. He stays like that for exactly three rapid heartbeats, stuck in the syrupy look Brian’s giving him, and then tears his head and his gaze back to the joints in front of him. 

“S’not that hard. Just gotta -- uh, practice lots,” and now Brian’s moved to kneel next to him, examining his process. With shaky hands, he finishes rolling the joint, seals it with a lick. “Here, this can be mine, it’s a little -- uh, a little fucked up. My hands are real shaky for no reason right now.”

“Prolly ‘cause I just scared you half to death with my nimbleness.”

Pat laughs. “Probably that’s it.” He gathers up the leftover papers and stuffs them back into the box he’d taken them from, trying his best not to look at Brian next to him. He sweeps up the leftover weed into the grinder and puts that back into the box, then picks up the box and the two joints and hands one to Brian. 

“Where’d you get that box, Pat? It’s so pretty,” Brian asks as they both stand up. 

Pat looks at the box in his hands as he goes to put it away. It’s about as long as his hand, wooden, with a hinged top and a clasp in the front. The flowers that are painted into the top and sides are colorful, purple and red and green and yellow, and the bottom has tiny legs like the claws of a bathtub. 

“My, uh. My ex’s dad gave it to me. He worked -- well, still does, I assume -- with wood. Made these, these really amazing wooden boxes and chests and drawers and -- and a bunch of things. Really gorgeous, intricate things. He gave this to me after we got married. It was this little, uh --” he realizes he’s rambling, as they walk out the door and towards the elevator, but Brian’s quiet so he figures he’s fine “-- little tiny City Hall ceremony thing, we were both broke and everything, and it was very spur-of-the-moment, but that was fine, and then after, when we told him about it, he gave it to me as a wedding gift. Was real sweet about it, even though we, uh, barely knew each other -- me and him, not me and her -- and was one of the nicest people about our breakup.”

At this point -- Pat doesn’t quite know how -- they’re in the elevator on their way to the roof. Brian, he realizes, is holding the quilt that’s normally folded at the bottom of his bed, and an extra jacket for Pat. He’s looking at him, smiling empathetically at Pat’s story, and when Pat makes eye contact he loses his train of thought. _How is he so goddamn_ nice, Pat thinks, and then remembers he hasn’t spoken in at least fifteen seconds. 

“He sounds real cool, Pat.”

Pat lets out a sigh, looking down at his boots just to not be looking at Brian. 

“Yeah. He was.”

“D’you, uh. Miss them? Him, and her?”

They’re almost at the top of the elevator now, and Brian gestures to Pat to get out first, handing him his sweater once they’re both out. 

“A little. We’ve gotten coffee a couple times since we broke up. Me and her,” he clarifies as they walk the extra half-staircase up towards the roof exit. “Him I haven’t seen. We never got that close. But she’s….she’s doing good. Teases me about not having a girlfriend yet.”

Brian looks at him, confused. “She doesn’t know you’re gay?”

“Nah. Never really, uh. Never really told her the whole story. I feel kinda bad about it, but I’m always worried she’ll, like. Think less of me, or something.”

Brian opens the door to the roof for him, and Pat steps out onto the roof, and holy _shit_. It’s fuckin’ _stunning_, the view from up here. Pat exhales, whistling a little, and Brian smiles a little at his wonder before continuing the conversation.

“Hmmm. Was there, uh. Was there, like. Was there a person? That, uh. That you were into, or anything, that caused...that caused you to figure things out, and all that?” 

Pat laughs, remembering his Gay Panic, _tee em_, as Brian sets out the blanket. “Not really. I’ve known since I was younger. Was just a matter of, of, like...admitting it. To myself, to other people, you know the drill.” He sits down next to Brian, grabs the lighter out of his pocket. “She’s still the hardest. I always feel like she’ll, like...that she’ll be upset I was keeping something from her for so long. That she’ll feel like I couldn’t trust her, or that she didn’t know me as well as she thought she did.”

“Honestly, Pat I feel like if I were her, I’d be relieved that it wasn’t me, it was you, and all that. Relieved that there was a real reason, and it wasn’t just that I wasn’t good enough.” He looks up at Pat when he says that, and Pat thinks that maybe there’s a direct string from Brian’s chin to his heart that jerks it around whenever Brian looks at him. 

And _god_, the fucking eye contact. Again. The eye contact is going to kill him, if the view doesn’t first. 

He lights up his joint before passing the lighter to Brian. 

“Actually,” Brian says, passing the lighter (dark red -- it matches Brian’s nails, Pat notices), “I was thinking of, like. Maybe sharing the joint. Don’t feel like getting too high tonight, just a lil’ buzzed,” he explains at Pat’s cocked head of a question.

“Sure, whatever.” He puff-puff-passes the joint to Brian, and doesn’t stare and doesn’t stare and doesn’t stare as Brian puts it to his lips. _It’s like we’re indirectly kissing_, the middle-schooler in his brain whispers at him. _Shut the fuck up_, he tells it. 

Brian leans his head back to exhale, and Pat tears his head away from Brian’s adam’s apple to the view in front of them. 

“Hell of a view, man.”

Brian smiles, and hands him back the joint. “Thanks. But I didn’t, like, make it special just for you.” He looks at Pat. “Kinda wish I could, though.” 

Pat’s heart feels like it’s unfolding. He takes a couple puffs.

And, well. Maybe it’s the weed. Maybe he’s just getting bolder in his old age. Either way, he says it. “God, Brian, why are you so nice to me like that?”

“What do you mean?” Brian looks taken aback, and Pat instantly regrets it. 

“Nothing.”

“S’not nothing, Pat Gill.”

Brian’s voice is just so, so soft, and Pat winces as he blows smoke upwards. 

“I just mean that, like. Sometimes you say things, and they kinda kill me, and I don’t know if you’re saying them just ‘cause we’re friends, or like,” he takes another drag, “‘cause of other, uh, reasons.”

“You mean like pity?”

Pat does not mean _like pity_. Pat means _like love_. Pat means _like the stupid dumb crush I have on you, do you feel the same way_. Pat means _is there any way you could love an old fucked-up man like me_. 

“Yeah, something like that.” He passes the joint back to Brian.

“Pat, you know I’m your friend. I say things like that ‘cause -- ‘cause I love you and want the best for you, like, literally always.”

“Hmm,” Pat says, because Brian’s looking at him again, and because he doesn’t know what Brian means, and because he doesn’t know what he’s doing, ever. 

They sit in silence for a second, passing the joint back and forth. Pat stares at the stars up above, and at Brian’s hands as he holds the joint expertly in one hand, and at the view of New York in front of them. When he looks at Brian again, Brian’s looking at him, and it’s like there’s something tangible between them that’s holding them together. Pat shivers. 

Brian’s the one to break the silence.

“Being around you feels like — sometimes it feels like —“

“Like?”

“Like —” Brian fishes for words for a second, taps the joint out onto the concrete of the roof. “Okay, this is gonna be real obscure, but there’s this type of poem called — called a pantoum, I think — where you write four lines per stanza, and then take the second and fourth lines of that stanza and make them the first and third lines of the next line, and so on, and it’s so hard to get perfect, and it feels like you have to work so hard to go anywhere with it that’s not just circles, but then when it works it fuckin —- it’s beautiful, and meaningful, and clicks in all the right places to be impactful in just the right ways.”

“So you’re saying I’m...difficult.”

“Jesus, Patrick, no, I’m saying that sometimes it’s hard to say what I want to say around you, but when I can, when I let myself, it’s -- it's like, the most gratifying and wonderful thing in the world and I want to just -- just -- keep it forever and think about it all the time and share it with everyone I love except that you’re the main person I love right now, I think, except for, like, my mom, and Laura, and whatever, and anyways, my point is — my point is —“

“Can I kiss you?” _oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck_\--

Brian lets out the world’s longest sigh-laugh. “Jesus Christ, Pat Gill, I thought I was going to have to -- have to -- like, hit you over the head with it, how much I want you to kiss me.”

“That’s a yes?”

“Patrick,” Brian says, taking his hand like he’s explaining how to tie your shoes to a four year old for the thousandth time. “I very, very much would like to kiss you. Oh, don’t look so surprised, Pat,” he says at Pat’s fishmouthed face. “You _had_ to have known that I was into you. I’ve asked you out _at least_ six times. I flirt with you goddamn constantly. I -- I literally told Simone to nudge you along, too, when you really weren’t getting it. Oh my God, Pat, I thought you --”

“Hold on,” Pat interrupts. “You told -- Simone knew?”

“Yeah,” Brian laughs. “She said she’d help, and did literally nothing helpful.”

“That snake! That fucking _snake_! That _fiend_! Simone! Jesus Christ, I fuckin' -- I told her, too, that I had, uh, feelings for you, and that double-crossing snake Simone said fuck-all about you liking me too.”

“Oh my God,” Brian groans, and they’re both laughing, because, _Simone_, “I cannot believe she kept this from both of us. Just for the drama of it all, what a fuckin’ _diva_, I’m gonna kill her.”

“She had too much power, and she used every bit of it for evil.”

“I _knew_ it, I knew something was up, she kept giving real cryptic answers when I asked if she knew anything from your angle, and going _Brian, maybe he’s just too dumb for you_.” Pat almost chokes from laughing at this part. “I’m gonna actually murder her.”

“Fuckin’ -- I’ll help, Brian, Jesus.” 

Brian grins at him, something full-watt and no-holds-barred and drop-dead-_gorgeous_, and Pat can do nothing but grin back, wildly. 

“So, uh. Where did we land, vis a vis the kissing?” Pat feels like a teenager. He also doesn’t really care.

“Right. Pat Gill, I need you to know that you do not need to ask to kiss me in the future, but I’m very flattered that you did. Real -- real chivalrous of you.”

“Enthusiastic consent, and all that,” Pat mumbles, playing with the edge of the blanket.

“Like I said. Chivalrous.” Brian scoots closer and holds Pat’s chin in one hand, lifting it up so that Pat’s looking at him, and Pat’s heart is somewhere around three hundred miles an hour, and Brian says, “I always want to kiss you. Enthusiastically.”

And with that, Pat does the thing he’s wanted to do for what feels like a century now and leans in to kiss Brian. 

And it’s like bursting open and doing somersaults and exploding and drowning and dream-floating and coming home all at once. 

And Pat can feel Brian laugh against his lips, and can feel himself laughing right back. 

+++

They end up lying on the blanket for almost an hour after that first kiss, making out sometimes and laughing at each other, finishing off the other joint and kissing more, cuddling up as close as they’ll get and making bits of conversation. Brian’s in the middle of tracing a line down Pat’s slightly crooked nose when Pat pulls up the guts to ask the question that’s been on his mind for a bit.

“Hey, uh, Bri?” He’s never called him _Bri_ before, but it seems like a good time as any to start.

“Yeah, Pat Gill?”

“When you, uh. Earlier, when you said that I was maybe the person you loved most in the world, and uh. I just. Wanted to uh, to know what that…meant.”

Brian sighs, and the airflow directly to Pat’s eyes makes them water just a little. “Don’t worry, Pat, m’not gonna drop the non-lesbian L-word like that on you on our first real date-thing.”

“Good. ‘Cause, like, I love you so goddamn much as a friend, and like, have that whole crush on you thing, obviously, but m’not, like. In love. Yet.”

“Me neither. Deffo approaching it, though.” Brian’s sleepy, Pat notices, as the time his eyes are closed after blinks gets longer and longer. 

Pat smiles. “Yeah. Samesies, I think.”

Brian just hums, eyes still closed, and reaches out to rub tiny circles on Pat’s side. 

They stay like that for a second longer, Pat’s eyes getting heavier and heavier. 

“Gotta go inside eventually, though,” Brian says sleepily. 

“Hmmf. Don’t wanna.” He’s warm, and cozy, and a little buzzy. 

“Patrick Gill, I’m giving you five more minutes.”

Pat laughs. “You sound like my mom.”

Brian smiles next to his cheek. “Gotta say, Pat, I can’t get enough of your laugh. I honestly -- I would do anything for it, if you haven’t noticed.”

Pat melts. “I -- I’ve literally thought the same way about making you laugh. S’a little -- embarrassing, what I’d do for it.”

“Oh, god, _same_, Pat. I’ve done such stupid shit just to hear that laugh. Best moments of my life.”

Pat grins and kisses him again, and again. Eventually, Brian squirms out from under him. “M’serious, though, ‘bout the five minutes. M’cold. Five more minutes or else we’re gonna --”

Pat finishes the sentence by kissing him again. It’s a little clumsy, and they’re still definitely high, and Brian’s mouth is somehow still a little cold under his, but he makes it work.

“Now how many more minutes do I have?” Pat says when he comes up for air. 

Brian smiles, all-out as usual. _I never half-ass anything, Pat Gill_.

He glances at his watch. “I’d say about four and a half, and then I'm breaking up with you if you don't come inside."

Pat laughs. “Asshole.”

“Nah,” Brian said, melting into him again and doing his best impression of a whisper. “You’ve got all my time, baybey.”

Pat kissed his cheek, and his hand, and his forehead. “All your time?”

“All my time, Pat Gill. For always.”

And Pat’s chest swells, swells swells.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is it for now!! school started up again and work hours are increasing, so i did my best to wrap things up. might add more later on but i had this ending in my brain from the beginning and really wanted to at least get to this point before i ended it. thanks y'all, this has been such a good experience <3
> 
> also, all of these titles are song titles, obviously. highly recommend listening to all of them! they're either what i listened to while writing or songs that fit the emotions of the chapter or both.

**Author's Note:**

> any sort of commentary is so so welcome!!
> 
> bonus points to anyone who finds all the times i use the phrase "five minutes"


End file.
